You should ask him right away. Could you please let us know what he says?
I will punch semiotics in its big fat face every time it rears its big fat face.
It’s nice to see someone else calling someone on this. What in the world does your opinion about running over a dog have to do with a thread about a swastika tattoo? His entire argument seems to be “GusNSpot said something stupid here, so we know whatever he says now is stupid.”
I’ve never understood why people let these classic ad hominem arguments pass. If anything, they seem to say that you don’t have any legitimate counterargument.
Can’t you get tattoos lazored off these days?
I mean if it was something from the past, and the guy can afford gym membership, why would you want to still walk around like that …
Yep, I’d be curious enough to say something like ‘well, that’s … unusual…?’
Or barring that, he could get a tattoo artist to change it into something else. A big black square if nothing else. If the guy still has it, he’s obviously not too bothered to be walking around with a Nazi symbol inked on his body.
Is this about casein?
Ok, bumped into him yesterday and asked him about the…you know what. But I think you’ll be disappointed; I said what’s up with the, er, and pointed at my shoulder where the tat is. He gave us a raised eyebrow and said ‘Just something I had done a long time ago’. You’re thinking - did you follow up and ask him if he’s a fan of the Fuhrer, but his tone and body language were screaming ‘drop it’, and he left pretty quickly. So it was a bit of an awkward situation and I’m not really any the wiser.
However given that he didn’t launch into any Nazi diatribe or anything when asked about it I’m leaning towards treating him the same unless I get any concrete evidence of scumbaggery.
Obviously none of us can read his mind, but it sounds as though he was embarrassed. This is a tattoo you saw once, inadvertently, correct? That he normally keeps covered? It will be interesting to see if he pulls back socially from you, going forward.
Thanks for keeping the peanut gallery (including me!) up to date.
my neighbor is one of the friendliest guys I ever met- totally awesome, but he has a rather intimidating appearance. I noticed the other day while talking with him that his knuckles are rather scarred up, which I usually take to indicate a rough past life.
I see no reason to treat him any different than his personality dictates.
What, you didn’t demand he prostrate himself on the ground and beg for your forgiveness on behalf of the Straight Dope??
Good for you. Very mature. Buy him a beer sometime.
Er…say what? Are you saying I was wrong to even ask about it?
Quite possibly, the impression I got at the time is that he just didn’t want to talk about it. It is pretty high on the shoulder, it would be covered by a t-shirt most of the time.
No, no. I’m proud of you for not making a dramatic scene, as some here seemed to suggest. I’m in the “give nice people the benefit of the doubt” camp.
You asked him about what? What on earth are you talking about? What did you ask him about? His sweet Peel P50? If you haven’t you really should. Those things are kick-ass.
Me too, but I’m also in the “nice people don’t have swastika tattoos” camp. Which is a nicer camp than the ones that people with swastikas put you into.